How much does it cost to bake a cake?

How much does it cost to bake a cake? Have you ever asked yourself that question when looking to buy a cake and thought surely it can’t be that much, it’s flour, eggs, butter and sugar after all. But we thought it would be fun to actually drill down into the figures so you know exactly what bang you’re getting for your buck.

This is to give you an idea of how much it costs to bake a cake that would give you 12 large portions or 24 dessert portions – an 8″ triple layer round cake and what the vast majority of our party cakes look like. And our party celebration cakes are truly scrumptious – made fresh to order, mouthwateringly delicious and not too heavy on the pocket.

So, how much does it cost to bake a cake? The lowdown

The Ingredients

So the ingredients aren’t the biggest part of the equation but they do count for a fair bit of the cake and of course these are bulk/wholesale prices which are lower than what you pay in the supermarket

For the cake

400g butter £2.56

400g sugar £0.29

400g flour £0.25

8 free-range eggs £1.29

1 tbsp vanilla essence £0.09

Total £3.18

For the buttercream

400g butter £2.56

800g icing sugar £0.74

1 tbsp vanilla essence £0.09

Strawberry jam £0.33

Total £3.72

Materials

10″ Cake board £0.18

10″ Cake box £0.75

Food colours, sprinkles, piping bags £0.25

Sundries ( washing up, tea towels etc) £0.15

Total £1.33

Electricity and Water

Electricity £1.05

Water £0.10

Total £1.15

Grand total = £9.38

Okay, so at this point it doesn’t look too bad right? So why does it cost so much more when you buy one from a bakery? Well when you add on labour and profit suddenly it gets a bit more chunky!

Labour £15

Suddenly the total is a bit more at £24.38

Now much as I would love to do cake at cost I am in the business of making a profit, plus I have rent and bills to pay on my commercial premises so with a moderate amount of gross profit (just under 45% to be exact), it works out at £45 for a basic buttercream party cake. From that gross profit I essentially have to pay all those bills – marketing, accountancy, equipment, training, health and safety, cleaning, website and administration.

There will be some people who may think that’s a bit too expensive for a cake and others who think it is more than reasonable but we like to think we peg our cakes at a decent level so you can have a high quality made to order cake that won’t break the bank. You won’t find us charging supermarket prices (mass produced, low quality and full of preservatives) but we won’t give you a supermarket cake either – instead you’ll get something much nicer.

Obviously we do the fancy cakes too and then costs really do go up with labour being one of the major factors. The more complex and labour intensive the cake, the more it will cost with wedding cakes running into £100s or even £1000s.

Pricing is one of those things that is an eternal conundrum and I don’t think anyone ever gets it completely right. But we like to be transparent so you know you’re getting a great deal for your money.